Inglourious Basterds

I went to the cinema at the weekend to see Inglourious Basterds. It was a typical Tarantino film, full of violence, good music, and a mix of genres.

The story centres on the Inglourious Basterds, a group of Jews from different countries, joining forces to teach the Nazi's a lesson. The group is led by St. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt).

It begins in the French countryside. Col. Hans Landa, the Jew Hunter, has come to visit the house of a dairy farmer and his daughters to question him on the whereabouts of a missing Jewish dairy farming family. Hans eventually finds them and has them murdered, but one, Shosanna Dreyfus, escapes. We come back to her a few years on, and she is living under the name Emmanuelle Mimieux. She owns a cinema, La Gamaar. Whilst working one day, a German soldier, Frederick Zoller, approaches, clearly attracted to this french girl. He reveals he is a war hero and his actions are to be celebrated in the war movie Stolz der Nation (Nations Pride). Shosanna being a secret Jew is sickened by ths fact and tells Zoller she has no interest in him, but he persists. One thing leads to another and she is suddenly holding a huge premier for the film at her cinema, and the highest leaders, Hitler, Goebbels, Bormann and Goring will be attending. Shosanna realises this is a great opportunity, and starts plotting the murder of the Nazi's.
Meanwhile, the Basterds are causing mayhem, scalping Nazi's and making themselves known. The British find out about the film premiere and join forces with the Basterds to blow up the cinema, with the help of an insider, the glamourous actress Bridget von Hammersmark. The first meeting with von Hammersmark leads to chaos and she leaves with an injured leg. The rest aren't so lucky.
The night of the film premiere arrives and both plots to kill the Nazi's are in place, but Col. Hans Landa catches on the the Basterds plans and tries to deal with them in his own way. I don't want to reveal the ending but it is definitely one not to be missed.

The acting in my opinion was superb, the best being Colonel Hans Landa, played by Christoph Waltz. He was charming, yet creepy and incredibly terrifying. He could change the atmosphere at the click of his fingers. Aldo Raine was another stand out character, he kept the mood light hearted when they were ripping the scalps off Nazi's, and his Italian accent was by far the best I've ever heard.
I read it received mixed reviews. The Guardian gave it a 1/5.

"It is achtung-achtung-ach-mein-Gott atrocious. It isn't funny; it isn't exciting; it isn't a realistic war movie, yet neither is it an entertaining genre spoof or a clever counterfactual wartime yarn. It isn't emotionally involving or deliciously ironic or a brilliant tissue of trash-pop references. Nothing like that."

On the otherhand The Independent gave it a 4/5. I think it isn't meant to be your run of the mill war movie, its not meant to be realistic, its a Tarantino film, and as we all know he has his own style of film making. The storyline bears no resemblance to what happened in real life, and if it did, I definitely didn't pay attention in my history lessons at school!
I thought it was interesting how the film was split up into chapters. I also liked how most of the film was either in French or German, which I didn't expect, but it made the film seem more genuine. Tarantino's use of German and French actors was definitely a wise choice. The idea of Americans playing those roles is just wrong!
Overall I liked it, it was entertaining, funny, sad, disgusting, and it pretty much kept my attention throughout. There were some long talking parts, but these all usually led up to something big and explosive. Another recommended film!